Research project How do we learn to be professional? This project studies future doctors and their education in professionalism. Through close studies of teaching in the medical programme, the project aims to answer the question of what works when it comes to developing students' ability for empathy, respectful patient interactions, and ethical conduct.
This project explores how professional conduct is taught in medical education, focusing on empathy, respectful interactions, and ethical decision-making. Using practice theory, it examines the social and material conditions shaping learning. Through case studies of simulation exercises, the project identifies effective teaching methods. The goal is to provide insights into how professional conduct can be best developed to prepare students for real-world challenges.
Umeå University
This project explores how education in professionalism can be organized within training programs leading to professions involving direct human interaction. As an example, it examines medical education and the medical profession, where empathy, respectful interactions, and the ability to make quick decisions are crucial. Despite the clear importance of professionalism, there is significant disagreement on how best to teach and develop this quality in education.
Using practice theory as a foundation, this project aims to highlight the social and material contexts in which learning of professional conduct takes place. Three key research questions are posed: What learning conditions exist in educational practice? What learning outcomes can be identified? And how do these conditions, both individually and collectively, contribute to desirable outcomes that foster students' professionalism?
The project employs a qualitative comparative evaluation (QCE) to analyze four case studies of simulation exercises within medical education. Using a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods (observations, surveys, and interviews), the project seeks to identify which learning activities are most effective in developing students’ professionalism. QCE integrates data from qualitative and quantitative methods into an analysis that reveals the conditions associated with desirable (and undesirable) outcomes.
The anticipated results of the project include empirical insights into how professionalism can be best developed, specifically by identifying key conditions, effective strategies, and learning activities given these conditions.
